Love
by chiba-x-thanks
Summary: He wonders if there's anything he can do, or if he's just going to be lost from now on. Crepsley/Arra One-shot.


_A/N: He wonders if there's anything he can do, or whether he's going to be lost from now on. One-shot, Crepsley/Arra. There's a severe lack of Crepsley/Arra, I think :)_

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* * *

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The first time he sees her, his eyes gloss over her to find Gavner. Same for the second time, same for the third, and probably a few more times even after that. He subconsciously learns her name, learns to recognize her, but never sees her in a crowd.

It isn't love at first sight, not on either count. He's _fairly_ ugly, after all, and she isn't anything special. Or so he thinks. Other people fuss around him, because she's a _girl,_ and a lot of them haven't seen one of those in a while, but that doesn't make a lot of difference to him. There are a _lot_ of women outside the Mountain, aren't there, and none of them are so contrary, so unpleasant, he bets. He's never met a person that _infuriates_ him so much. Is there anyone in the world that could heat his blood like _she _does, anybody that could make him so _angry?_

No. He doesn't think so.

* * *

What changes?

What changes him from despising her to adoring her, all in one swift turn? Maybe it's just having to spend such a long time in the same place as her, maybe it's finally actually _speaking_ to her instead of assuming. Or maybe it's just that this was how it was _supposed_ to be.

But he's ever so, _ever so_ stubborn, and so is she. He doesn't think she'd be very pleased to hear him say _I love you_ like he wants to so desperately. Maybe she'd just pretend not to hear him. Maybe she'd even _laugh_. What would he do _then?_ He doesn't remember ever feeling so insecure about anything ever,_ ever_ before, and he hates that she knows whatever happens he would _never _laugh at her.

Or does she?

* * *

He kisses her one last time, and then her head lulls into his shoulder calmly, and he lets himself smile.

'Larten?'

She's never sounded so quiet. He just pats her hair away from her face to let her know he's listening.

'I love you.'

Before he can even return the sentiment, he thinks about it, and then he does the one thing he always promised he wouldn't. He _laughed,_ and felt her tense, as if he was insulting her. He supposed being laughed at had been his biggest fear, and so he wrapped his arms around her back and kissed her again.

'I love you, too.'

* * *

'I always--'

There's a long, awkward silence, but he doesn't think it all that awkward. He doesn't want to look down at her, just in case she _is_ crying, because he doesn't think he'd be able to handle that.

She sniffs, and then turns her back on him again, and when she turns back she's a cold and impassive as ever. It's like looking at two sides of a coin, and this is the side he knows best, this side he can't beat.

'Go on, then,' she says, and finds herself a sweater. It isn't cold, it's just that she's embarrassed, and maybe if she puts another sweater on she can hide herself away from him and pretend this never happened. 'Go on, _leave_.'

'Arra--'

'--Never said I cared whether you stayed or not,' she says, and her voice cracks as if really, _inside_, she's just as torn up as he is. How can he blame her for snapping at him, when she's finally made herself seem vunerable, and he knows how much she _hates_ that?

He waits a moment for her to calm down, just in case she storms away, and then he speaks.

'Arra, I--'

'I doesn't matter,' she replied.

'I don't need you.'

* * *

He tries to tell her to hold still, to just relax, that she's going to be alright all in one breath, and he can't get any of the words out because they're so tangled in his head.

How many hours has it been since she was injured? It doesn't feel like it's been very long, but the early morning has turned into dusk, and so it must have been quite a while. His eyes slide shut a few times, but then she takes another sharp, painful breath, and his eyes snap open again, and his hand grasps hers.

'Arra,' he whispers, and it hurts him to look at her when she is just a shadow of herself, when she looks so pale and so distressed. 'Arra, _shh_. Breathe.'

She lets out an involuntary whimper, and he reaches out to thumb away the drops of blood that have collected around her lips.

'I love you,' he says, and still feels a _little_ like she might laugh at him, but of course that's a childish fear, and she does nothing of the sort. She doesn't say anything, just leans her head into his shoulder and coughs, and then eventually there's nothing.

Absolutely nothing.

He wonders if there's anything he can do, or whether he's just going to be lost from now on. There's a strange feeling in the back of his throat, and eventually he just places a sad kiss on her pale lips, not knowing what else to do.

_What else can he do?  
_

'I love you.' he says, and then----

* * *

----and then his eyes snap open, and he's right where he always was, with her head still in his neck, and her soft breath against his jaw.

'What?' she asks, and he hopes his dreams _aren't _a foreshadowing.

* * *

_fin._


End file.
